14 February 2012 :

Ron Briggs, along with the other authors of the initiative which expanded California’s death penalty law in 1978 (Proposition 7, the Briggs Death Penalty initiative), recently announced their support for repeal of the law. 
Writing in the Los Angeles Times, Ron Briggs, 55, white, explained that the 1978 Briggs Initiative was meant to “give prosecutors better tools for meting out just punishments, and that a broadened statute would serve as a warning to all California evildoers that the state would deliver swift and final justice” and “create a national model for capital punishment.” Thirty-four years later, he and his co-authors have all independently concluded that the system is not working. Briggs wrote, “Each of us remains a staunch Republican conservative, but our perspectives on the death penalty have changed. We'd thought we would bring California savings and safety in dealing with convicted murderers. Instead, we contributed to a nightmarish system that coddles murderers and enriches lawyers. Our initiative was intended to bring about greater justice for murder victims. Never did we envision a multibillion-dollar industry that packs murderers onto death row for decades of extremely expensive incarceration. We thought we would empty death row, not triple its population.” Briggs concluded, “Had I known then what we do today, I would have pushed for strong life sentences without the possibility of parole. I still believe that society must be protected from the most heinous criminals, and that they don't deserve to ever again be free. But I'd like to see them serve their terms with the general prison population, where they could be required to work and pay restitution into the victims' compensation fund.” 
Ron Briggs is currently a member of the Board of Supervisors in El Dorado County, California.